I recently have been given a pre-64 M70 featherweight and wanted to get some ideas or any suggested modifications to the common reloading recipes due to the sorter, 22in, barrel. Also since I am not too familiar with this M70, is it possible to interchange a standard length barrel to this stock? Thanks for any input.

Jason

Jason: I used to have one and still kick myself for selling it. I used 120gr bullets with IMR4350. It was easy to get good accuracy and 3100 fps. It's the equivalent of a 25/06 in a nice handling , short barrel package. Wanna sell it?

Dear Jason,
I think you`ll find the contour of the "featherweight" barrel to be a lot different than the standard weight 26" barrel. Thus, the only way to make it fit is to ruin the fearherweight stock. That`s the bad news. The good news is that with the same loads in my dear ol dads 264[featherweight] the only loss was 110 fps from the standard. He still got well over 3000 fps with the shorter 22" barrel. This was using Hodgdons H-870 and 140 Gr Sierras. Good luck with a great calibre. If the "Gun Nazis" came down and said I could only have one gun it`d be the 264 Win Mag!!Let the flames begin.

Aloha, Mark[in Or]